[4] In August 2018, Minister of Justice Andrew Little proposed that a conversion therapy ban could be considered as part of a reform to the Human Rights Act 1993.
[7] After this plan was voted down by coalition partners New Zealand First, the governing Labour Party announced in October 2020 it would definitively ban the practise if re-elected.
[12] Opponents of the Bill including National's justice spokesperson Simon Bridges, Chris Penk, and Barbara Kuriger supported the intentions of the legislation but expressed concerns about penalising parents and its allegedly vague language.
The committee's chair Ginny Andersen also sought to allay the concerns of opponents that the bill would penalise parents for having conversations with their children about sexuality and gender.
[20] In late May 2023, The Spinoff reported that no legal action had been taken under the criminal and civil provisions of the Conversion Practices Prohibition Legislation Act.
Meanwhile, the Human Rights Commission confirmed that it had received 33 inquiries relating to conversion therapy but that none of them had been escalated into the civil redress pathway.
[21] The Salvation Army's Territorial Governance Board for New Zealand, Fiji, Tonga and Samoa has opposed a range of conversion therapy practices including prayers on the basis that these constitute "vilification or discrimination on the grounds of sexuality and gender.
Lal disagreed with the National Party's assertion that the bill would criminalise parents for advising their children against taking puberty blockers; arguing instead that the bill banned parents from forcibly stopping their children from taking puberty blockers with the intention of suppressing their chose gender identity or expression.
Lal disagreed with the bill giving the Attorney-General the sole discretion to prosecute cases of conversion therapy, claiming that it could be use by anti-LGBT forces to deny the rights of LGBT peoples.
The Young Nats have called for clarity around the term "suppression" in order to address concerns about parents being prosecuted for conversion therapy.
The National Collective of Independent Women's Refuges submitters Natalie Thorburn and Cleo Arathoon have argued intention should not be included at all in order to prevent "abusers" from escaping prosecution.
[27] Following the passage of the legislation into law, Chief Human Rights Commissioner Paul Hunt stated that the bill sent "an unequivocal message that conversion practices, which have destructive and sometimes fatal consequences, have no place in this country".
[6] The conservative Christian advocacy group Family First New Zealand claimed that a ban on conversion therapy would criminalise parents wanting to protect their child from the "physical, emotional, and psychological harm" caused by gender dysphoria.
Family First also objected to a five-year prison term for parents for affirming gender identities that correspond to their children's biological sexes.
[23] The center-right National Party's parliamentary caucus opposition to the Bill was criticised by Young Nats President Stephanie-Anne Ross.
However, The New Zealand Herald and Stuff journalists Thomas Coughlan and Henry Cooke claimed that this demotion was the result of Bishop's disagreement with the Party's stance on banning conversion therapy and for advocating a conscience vote on the bill.
[33][34] On 30 August, Collins denied losing her temper at Bishop and fellow National MP Erica Stanford for publicly suggesting that they disagreed with the Party's stance on the legislation.